ok, this has come up before, so maybe i'm wrong about this. here's my best dyno chart, which i think will provide us with an interesting discussion about throwing aggressive cams on a stock block:



ok, the first thing to note is that i don't make dick for power below 7000 rpms. it's also worth noting that when you slide the powerband upwards without changing the final drive ratio in the transmission, 1/4 mile times don't improve as drastically... that's why people running ls/vtecs with the stock LS transmission bitch about their long gears; they may have added 40 hp, but their gearing is all off... so is mine. plus i suck at driving. combine those three factors with a stock clutch and you've got yourself an embarassing 14 second car.

ok, now the graph itself. you'll notice a dip at 6500 rpms, where my vtec x-over point is. this is due to the fact that the stock compression ratio can't fully support the "high end" vtec lobes until about 7000 rpms, but the stock ecu (i'm running a vafc) freaked out when we set it that high, so we compromised at 6500. so up until 7000-ish, the 10.2:1 ratio is much happier using the low end lobes.

now, and this is the part i may be wrong about, but i still make 150 hp at 9500 rpms. that's pretty good, and it's clear that the cams have more in them than the bottom end can support. most motors drop off quickly after the peak hp point, but this one slowly tapers off. so stock clutch + 15 year old transmission with insufficient final drive gear + crappy driver means i drop about 2500 rpms between shifts. so if i shift at 8500, i drop below the vtec crossover point and into snooze-land, but if i shift at 9500 rpms, i drop to about 7000 rpms, which is as low as the engine is comfortable on the aggressive cam lobes.

whew... so, i think this is worth a discussion... have i made my point? i've tried shifting lower at the track, and it noticeably hurts my times. i think i've got it right. thoughts?